Residents not happy with AT&T boxes in yards

Thursday

AT&T has upset some Springfield residents with its plans to install nearly 100 utility boxes around the city, some of them in people’s yards.

AT&T has upset some Springfield residents with its plans to install nearly 100 utility boxes around the city, some of them in people’s yards.

The boxes are being installed so that AT&T can begin offering digital video service here. They also will help the telecommunications giant upgrade its Internet and telephone services.

Many of the boxes will be on city-owned right-of-ways between the sidewalk and the street. But others are to be placed in utility easements, which can be in residents’ yards.

A utility easement allows telephone, water and electric utilities, among others, to use a portion of a homeowner’s yard for specific purposes, such as running pipes or wires to the house.

Jim Bauer, who lives on Whitefield Road, said two wooden stakes marked “easement” mysteriously appeared in his backyard last year. Bauer said he called the city about it but never heard back.

AT&T representatives visited Bauer about three weeks ago to tell him they were going to put a 5-by-5-foot concrete pad with a box on the utility easement inside his backyard fence. The AT&T representatives said the city would not approve installation of the box until they told him about it, Bauer said.

Two telephone utility boxes already are positioned just outside Bauer’s fence, but AT&T representatives told him they could not put the new box there. Bauer’s wife had to remove flowers and an azalea bush to accommodate the new box, he said.

“It’s like big business saying, “The heck with the little guy,’” Bauer said. “We’re going to do what we want to make a profit.”

Joseph Flynn, who lives on South Douglas Avenue, said he suggested an alternate spot for one of the boxes to AT&T that would be in his backyard beside his garage instead of on the city’s right of way.

“They’ve been working to accommodate me,” Flynn said. “One of my concerns besides the ugliness is that it’s going to be close to my driveway, where my wife and I back out. It’s a traffic hazard.”

Flynn also thought he should have received notice before AT&T began digging in the right of way.

“I understand it’s public property, but we’ve maintained it for the last 16 years,” Flynn said.

Ernie Slottag, a spokesman for Mayor Tim Davlin, said AT&T has given the city a list of where the boxes are to be located. Slottag said he could not provide the list Wednesday because it was in a computer to which he had no access. He said he would provide it Thursday.

“Some are in public places. Some are in backyards,” Slottag said.

“Part of the package is to disguise them with landscaping,” he added. “Through Springfield Green, we’re going to try to put something in front of them to help them blend in with the neighborhood.”

According to Slottag and Andrew Ross, a spokesman for AT&T, the city reviews where the boxes are to go, but “if it’s on a right-of-way or a utility easement, we’re allowed to move forward,” Ross said.

AT&T will “restore the area to same or better condition,” he said.

Ross declined to say when AT&T would introduce its U-Verse video service in Springfield. He said legislation awarding the corporation a statewide franchise to offer television service over the Internet has already created 1,400 new jobs in Illinois. The service is available in parts of 230 Illinois communities now.

“We’re working to choose locations that are as conducive to neighborhood aesthetics as possible,” Ross said. “We always try to let customers know beforehand.”

Chris Wetterich can be reached at (217) 788-1523 or chris.wetterich@sj-r.com.

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